What Is the Essence of the Truth?

Knowledge of Ten Main Aspects to the Essence of the Truth

How can one know the essence of the truth? There are ten main aspects: 1. The truth is something positive. Because positive things come from God’s words, they can only be gained by experiencing God’s work.

These positive things are the life reality that created mankind must accept, they are what mankind love and they are the reality that mankind must possess. Without possessing the reality of positive things, then mankind would not be mankind. Therefore, all created beings must have knowledge of positive things and must have knowledge of the reality of positive things and the essence of the truth—only in this way will they be able to gain the truth as their life. 2. The truth is what God has and is. God expresses what He has and is to make people seek knowledge of it and also to allow them to gain it. Therefore, within the image of the truth that man lives out there is the image of God. 3. The essence of the truth is being clear on what to love and what to hate, it reflects God’s fairness and righteousness, and it completely manifests God’s glory. 4. The essence of the truth is love and light, which inspires people’s yearning and pursuit and their wish to live in love and light. 5. The essence of the truth is true light. It can expose darkness and evil and it can light man’s way. 6. The truth is the life and the way. It can make people truly repent and break away from Satan’s influence, and it can bring to people genuine human life. 7. The essence of the truth is goodness and beauty. Living out the truth is admirable and inspires others’ longing to pursue and gain the truth. 8. The truth is holiness and light. It is without filth or corruption. 9. The essence of the truth is faithful and reliable. It is visibly trustworthy and convincing. 10. The essence of the truth is the reality of the truth that normal humanity should possess. Therefore, the truth is able to become man’s life, it is real, and it is absolutely not empty imagination or doctrine. All those who are now experiencing God’s work can see: By practicing the truth, you can allow others to see what God’s righteousness and fairness is all about. The truth clearly shows what to love and what to hate. The more you practice the truth, the more you can reveal God’s righteousness and bear witness to His righteousness, and the more you practice the truth, the fairer you will be to others. The truth, therefore, reflects God’s fairness and righteousness. Everyone yearns for God’s righteousness and fairness, and they long for righteousness to hold power and for there to be true fairness amongst mankind. So that which can reflect righteousness and fairness is indeed the truth. When someone really gains the truth and they live by the truth, they are fair to other people, whilst at the same time manifesting the righteousness of God. We replace and reject false leaders and antichrists, and furthermore we curse antichrists, for they are the hated enemies of God as well as of God’s chosen people. Does this not reflect God’s righteousness? Could you do this without the truth? Could you discern false leaders and antichrists without the truth? Would you be able to distinguish clearly what to love and what to hate, as God does? Could you love what God loves and hate what God hates? You could never do this—only when you possess the truth can you achieve this. Therefore, the truth has this effect and it is an aspect of the reality, right? The truth is love, and when you live within the truth you can then love others, and you can also love God. The more truth you possess, the more you can love God and love other people. There are two commandments of God: One is to love God your Lord with all your heart, all your mind and all your strength, and the other is to love others as you do yourself. These two commandments can only be obeyed when one possesses the truth; for those without the truth, these two commandments are just empty words. So on whom are these two commandments ultimately fulfilled? They are fulfilled on those who pursue the truth and gain the truth. Therefore, if you live out the essence of the truth, you will have love. Only with the truth can you truly love God, and only with the truth can you love others as you do yourself. To love others as you do yourself is to love other people the same as you love yourself—not being selfish and not being mean but treating others fairly. Someone asks: “So does someone who has the truth love everybody?” No. They love people; they don’t love devils, and they don’t love Satan. This “others” does not include the devils and Satan. If you think that the “others” in “loving others as you do yourself” includes the devils and Satan, then you have misinterpreted what God means by “others.” What God means by “others” is people who have human spirits. Those who do not have human spirits are beasts in human clothing, and they are animals and devils. Understand? From this, do you see that the essence of the truth is love? Furthermore, the truth is true light. Why do I say it is true light? Because it can expose all people and all things, and what is positive and what is negative. The truth can expose people, and God’s words can expose people. The truth is true light, right? The truth is the life and the way, and it is the life which man should pursue. The life with the truth is the best life, the highest life, the life which created beings should attain and the life that God bestows on man. In the last days, God works using the truth to judge and chastise man. That is, God wants to have the truth wrought into man by means of His judgment and chastisement. Therefore, the truth itself is life and it is the way that man should follow. Only when one has the truth as their life can they embark upon the true way of human life. So the essence of the truth is the life and the way. Isn’t that right? The essence of the truth is goodness and beauty. Because you live out the truth, you have a truly good heart, you can love others as you do yourself and can love God with all your heart and all your strength. In this way, the most goodhearted people love God first, and secondly they love others as they do themselves—the most goodhearted people have love. Those who do not love God and who cannot love others as they do themselves have no love. Therefore, the essence of the truth is goodness and beauty. When you live out the essence of the truth, you then live out the image of the truth, and then that can make others yearn and desire to pursue and gain the truth. Isn’t that right? The truth is holiness and light. When you possess the truth, you then naturally cast off all of your satanic corruption, and you are naturally free from all filth and all evil. The more you love the truth, the more you hate evil, and the more you love the truth, the more you come to love holiness. Therefore, those who live by the truth are truly holy and are not hypocrites, and this is why the essence of the truth is also holiness and light. The more someone has the truth, the more they live in the light—there is no darkness. Everything they do is honest and straightforward, they never engage in plots or cunning schemes, and they are never calculating. People with the truth act wisely, for the essence of the truth is also wisdom. Therefore, after thoroughly understanding the essence of the truth, an immediate result is that we come to know God completely. God possesses all these manifestations of the essence of the truth. We see that God is the truth, and there is not the slightest bit of falseness about it. God is the truth, God is holy, God is righteous, God is wise, God is almighty, God’s essence is faithful, God’s essence is love, and all of God’s essence and all the essence of God’s life is held within the essence of the truth. Therefore, we can make a final conclusion: God is the truth and there is no mistake at all about this; all truth is within God, and all truth is manifested in the reality of God’s life.

If we pursue the truth, then even though our gains are limited, and we only gain a little, we can still manifest God a little and live out a little of what God is; of course, although all that we live out is just a one hundred millionth part of the truth and what God has and is, just one drop in the ocean, we can still gain God’s praise. These truths God expresses are indeed prepared for us. And when we have gained them, tell me, what fraction of all that God has and is do these truths make up? One ten thousandth? One hundred millionth? That is a drop in the ocean of all that God has and is! People in the Age of Grace spoke foolish things. What did those leaders and great men who believed in God say? They said that within the whole Bible was the entirety of God’s expressions, and that there were no expressions of God besides those in the Bible. That was a preposterous thing to say, right? How preposterous was it? They regarded God as so insignificant; could God only express those few truths found in the Bible? Those few truths found in the Bible do not even make up one hundred millionth of all that God has and is. Are there as many truths in the Bible as there are expressed in the last days? They are less than one ten thousandth of those truths expressed in the last days. The amount of truths expressed in the last days surpasses those in the Age of Law and the Age of Grace combined hundreds of times over. How much of what God has and is do the expressions of God during His three stages of work constitute? They are still not enough to make up one ten thousandth, or one hundred millionth. Some people ask, “Is that true?” It goes without saying that it is so true! If you think that God has expressed all His words and all He is and has within this book of God’s words, and if you think that you have understood this book and grasped all within it, then have a try at creating a creature, for example, creating a mosquito—and you will see that you cannot create anything. God can create all things in heaven and on earth, so how could this book bear full witness to God? This book doesn’t even have anything about the lives of aliens; it doesn’t mention it. Aliens are so able, they can live for thousands of years and they can build houses with their thoughts. Therefore, the words expressed by God during His three stages of work are just enough to be mankind’s life, and the life of mankind is delimited within these words, which is to say this is the boundary of life that God has set for mankind. Understand? These words are so much less than what God’s own life has and is—they are just a drop in the ocean. Therefore, we see that people who have experienced God’s work of the last days have some knowledge of God, and at least they don’t say those preposterous words “the entire Bible contains all the expressions of God, and there is no revelation of God and no expressions of God besides those in the Bible,” as religious leaders say. The religious people define God as being so insignificant, as though His omnipotence only goes so far. This is blaspheming God, plain and simple. Are religious people not absurd? Do you still worship religious pastors and leaders and have blind faith in them? By living out the image of the truths which God expresses, do we then become God? Why do we not become God? Because the truths God expresses are only meant for man to accept as their life, and they are only the life reality prepared for man, for created mankind. The life reality of God Himself is tens of thousands of times or hundreds of millions of times greater than this. Therefore, no matter how much we are able to practice the truth or how much we can live out the truth, we are still not God, and what we live out is merely a manifestation of a one hundred millionth part of what God has and is. Don’t always think to become God—that’s just nonsense. That’s preposterous! That’s the thinking of Satan! When you have knowledge of the truth, when you have true knowledge of the essence of the truth, you then have knowledge of God; and when you have true knowledge of God, you can then truly love Him, truly obey Him and truly worship Him.

So do we now know a little about the essence of the truth? When you come to know the essence of the truth, your love for truth grows and becomes real, and you then become willing to pursue the truth. Are you willing to pursue the truth now? What practical advantages are there to pursuing the truth? As your statures are all at different stages of maturity, I shall tell you some of the most practical advantages. Those are that you will at least be able to discern between good and bad people, and you will not be deceived by Satan, false leaders or antichrists. With the reality of the truth, at the least you will be able to truly know God, truly love God, truly obey God and truly worship God, and can then live out a true human likeness, be an honest person, and cast off your deceit, crookedness, deception and lies. By living out the truth, ultimately you will be able to truly love God, love others as you do yourself, treat others fairly, serve alongside anyone, and you will be able to obtain the approval and respect of the people around you, inspire their longing and admiration, and they will like you. Living amongst others in this way is to live a life of value and meaning, and you will be able to become someone of use, someone who benefits others and someone whom everybody needs. So does someone like that have a genuine human life? People who are now without the truth are all wastrels, useless good-for-nothings, beasts in human clothing and lifeless shells. They can’t do anything, and crave for fleshly pleasures. Isn’t that the case? Those who have no truth whatsoever are all beasts in human clothing. They always want to wear nice clothes, but no matter how nice the clothes are, they’re still beasts. Those who possess the reality of the truth pay no attention to their appearance, to look ordinary is fine for them. What they do pay attention to is whether they have the truth. Someone may look like a silly old man but he may know the true way; you may wear a suit, leather shoes, and glasses, but when you give a sermon you put everyone to sleep. When someone who has the truth speaks a few words to you, you would get out your notebook and make a note of it immediately and try to memorize it in your heart, lest you forget it. If he says many hundreds, many thousands of words to you, you would be made very busy indeed, and you would think, “How will I remember all this? I mustn’t let these words slip away. I’m hearing them for the first time today, and they are so precious. If I forget them afterward then that would be terrible, and I really would lose out.” Your yearning reaches this extent. So, after someone who really has the reality of the truth says a few words to you according to your actions and speech, everything will click into place for you and you will suddenly see the light. Is this not impressive? Is this not beneficial? It is so beneficial! This can help you. If you say merely that you love others, but you cannot help them, then what kind of love is that? That kind of love is pointless and it’s of no use. When you can really help others then they’ll stick with you. There are so many who need help, for who is without any problems? Who is not in a dilemma? Who is not in a fog? They need someone to help and guide them, but without the truth, what guidance could you give? What could you use to help them? You could say a hundred words and it would still be no use; someone with the truth can resolve a problem with just one sentence. Don’t people with the truth live lives of value? Therefore, people love those who have the truth and dislike those who do not, and this is no mistake. Is the truth a positive thing? Only someone who has the truth is a person who has truly gained life, and those with life have the way of eternal life, they have God in their hearts; only they are loved, and they are the happiest people. So what are the manifestations of living out the reality of the truth? 1. Having true knowledge of one’s own corrupt essence and the truth of one’s own corruption, being truly repentant and turning over a new leaf—is this not someone in possession of the reality of the truth? 2. Seeking to be an honest person, living out a true human likeness and living out a normal humanity—is this not someone in possession of the reality of the truth? 3. Being willing to practice the truth and reject evil; being able to obey God and satisfy God in one’s duties—this is someone who is in possession of the reality of the truth. 4. Being clear on what to love and what to hate, loving that which God loves and hating that which God hates, being able to sincerely love both God and God’s chosen people, and having compassion for others—is this not someone in possession of the reality of the truth? 5. Choosing to follow Peter’s path of pursuing the truth and being perfected; not following antichrists or false leaders, and not engaging in religious ritual or believing in God in name only. 6. Yearning for the truth and yearning to enter entirely into reality and become perfect in order to satisfy God and glorify God; yearning more and more for the truth as one pursues the truth; always feeling like one is not living out much reality of the truth, that the truth one possesses is not enough, that it won’t do to enter into one truth but that one must enter into more truths, that it won’t do to live out a little reality of the truth but that one must live out the truth entirely, therefore yearning for deeper entry into the truth. 7. Being able to discern all manner of people and things; not merely having a thorough understanding of the essence of all kinds of people, but also having a thorough understanding of the essence of problems and, because of this understanding, never again suffering the deception, the misleading, the constraint or the control of Satan. 8. Feeling more how lovable God is the more one pursues the truth, and then desiring to gain everything that God has and is, and to live out the image of the truth. 9. Having the truth and doing one’s utmost to pursue being perfected by God; wishing to be put to some great use by God to carry out His will, and dedicate one’s whole life to carrying out God’s will—this is impressive, right? 10. Yearning for God’s judgment and chastisement, and His pruning and dealing, for without God’s judgment and chastisement, what one is able to gain is too little and too limited. Only God’s judgment and chastisement can perfect one entirely, therefore, one asks for God, God’s words and God’s judgment and chastisement to accompany one all one’s life.